Civil lawsuit alleging 'brutal' sexual assault launched against accused in Ont.'s 'Woodland rapist' case

An alleged child predator who was arrested and charged earlier this year is now facing a civil lawsuit in connection with a "brutal" sexual assault in a Toronto area park reported nearly 30 years ago.

An alleged child predator who was arrested and charged earlier this year is now facing a civil lawsuit in connection with a "brutal" sexual assault in a Toronto area park reported nearly 30 years ago.

A statement of claim filed with the Ontario Superior Court of Justice in May alleges that the plaintiff was 10-years-old when he was forced to perform sex acts on a stranger, identified in the filings as Richard Neil, who approached him while walking through Brampton's Norton Place Park on Sept. 29, 1994. 

This past March, Neil, 65, was arrested by Peel Regional Police following a decades-long investigation into a number of sexual assaults reported in the 90s.

The assaults, which all reportedly took place in forested areas, saw investigators dub their suspect ‘the Woodland Rapist.’

A composite sketch of a suspect was released around the time of the assaults, but no arrests were ever made. Searches in the national DNA database didn't turn up any matches to known offenders, either.

Investigators had previously speculated that the perpetrator may have died or moved from the area.

Fifteen years ago, police reopened the probe, releasing an image of a black cotton shirt left at one of the crime scenes. But it wasn’t until recently that DNA evidence provided the crack in the case investigators had sought for decades.